Vehicle seat designers have developed various seat and seat belt arrangements that attempt to provide a convenient seat belt system for a seat occupant. To this end, a more recent seat belt system, herein referred to as the integrated seat system, allows the seat belts to be installed directly on the vehicle seat regardless of the seat position within the vehicle. The integrated seat system thus remains in a constant position relative to the seat occupant, thereby placing the seat belt within easy reach of the seat occupant.
Some seat assemblies have been created that include a support mechanism to provide additional support for the seat assembly. These support mechanisms are intended to divert any loads and their resulting stresses away from the mounting pivots of the seat assembly. Although some of these support mechanisms have increased the structural strength of the seat assembly, to date their configurations have reduced the flexibility of the vehicle to carry cargo, which is a highly valued feature in the automotive industry. Specifically, vehicle manufacturers desire to provide a cargo load surface in the rear of a sedan or hatchback type vehicle by folding the rear seat backs forward into a mutually aligned position with the cargo compartment floor.
Some current support mechanism designs have allowed the seat backs to fold forward. However, these designs create cargo load surfaces that are discontinuous, i.e., there exists a large gap between the seat back and the support mechanism in which objects may inadvertently fall or become stuck. Therefore, there is a need in the automotive industry to provide an integrated seat system that creates a substantially continuous cargo load surface in a sedan or hatchback type vehicle from the rear of the interior compartment forward to the front seats.